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We have seen that only God Himself as life within us can fulfill His divine purpose. God has no intention to ask us to do something for Him. God’s intention is for us to take Him as life into us. Then He as our life will work out many things from within us. God’s intention is that He could be life to us, but we need to see how we can take Him as life.
The Gospel of John is a book of life. It tells us that Christ came that we may have life and have it abundantly (10:10). John tells us what Christ is and how we can take Christ as life. Christ is many things to us in the book of John, such as the light (8:12), the life (11:25), the way (14:6a), the door (10:9), the bread of life (6:35), and the living water (4:10, 14). But these are just the items of what Christ is, not the substance, the essence.
John 1:1 says, “In the beginning was the Word...and the Word was God.” Christ is the Word (v. 14). John also says that this very Christ who is the Word and who is God is Spirit. John 4:24 says, “God is Spirit.” We need to combine John 4:24 with 1:1. Christ is God, Christ is the Word, and Christ is the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:17). Christ is God as the source, Christ is the Word as the element, and Christ is the Spirit as the essence. So if we are going to take Christ as life, we have to contact the Spirit and the Word. Without contacting the Spirit and the Word, there is no way for us to take Christ as life.
Christ is the bread of life, the spiritual food, but to get this food you need to contact the Spirit and the Word. Without contacting the Spirit and the Word, there is no way for you to take the food. Christ is also the light. If you are going to enjoy the light, you need to contact the Spirit and the Word. Without contacting the Spirit and the Word, there is no way for you to get the light.
Christ as the all-inclusive One is the Spirit within us. We have the Spirit within and the Bible without. These are not two separate things but two aspects of one thing. This one thing is Christ Himself as God. Within us is the Spirit, and outside of us is the Bible, the Word. In this divine element are all the items of what Christ is, such as the life, the light, the food, the water, and the air. All these items are of the same element — the Spirit, the Word, and God. Christ is God, Christ is the Spirit, and Christ is the Word. We have Christ today as God the Spirit within us and as the element of the Word outside of us.
The Gospel of John tells us the way to take this very Christ, who is God as the Spirit and as the Word. The first way is by eating. This is revealed in chapter 6. The Lord said, “I am the bread of life...he who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me” (vv. 35, 57). The way to take Christ is to eat Him. Christ is eatable. Some may think that it is too wild or crude to say that we have to eat Christ. But the Lord Himself told us to eat Him. Only the things that we eat, that we take into us as food, can be our life supply.
One day the Lord Jesus said, “I am the bread of life...eat Me.” This was simple to such an extent that it bothered and puzzled even many of His disciples. They said to one another, “This word is hard; who can hear it?” (v. 60). They did not understand how they could eat Him. The Lord was simple to such an extent that people would not believe.
Also, today it is so simple to be saved and have Christ within us as our life. “Whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Rom. 10:13). It seems hard to believe that we could be saved in such a simple way. It is so marvelous yet so simple. When God created man, He did not give man many instructions about how to behave himself. God only put him in front of the tree of life that he might take in the tree of life (Gen. 2:8-9). This is the unique thing we need. We need to take in Christ. We need to eat Christ. This is why we have to know that Christ is the Spirit and the Word. Where is Christ? Christ is in the Spirit, and Christ is in the Word. We surely know that Christ is in the heavens, but if He were only in the heavens, we could not eat Him. He would be too far away from us. Christ today is the Spirit and is the Word. Whenever I touch the Spirit and contact the Word, I eat Christ.
Eating Christ is revealed in John 6, and drinking Him is revealed in chapter 7. The Lord said, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink” (v. 37). Following the eating is the drinking. To eat is to take in the bread. To drink is to take in the water. So we need the eating and the drinking. But this is not all. At the end of the Gospel of John, in 20:22, there is the breathing. We need eating, drinking, and breathing. After the Lord was resurrected, He came back to His disciples, breathed into them, and asked them to receive the Holy Spirit, the holy breath.
I say again, in this book we are told what Christ is, and we are also told how we can take this Christ in. He is the very God, He is the Spirit, and He is the Word. We can take Him in by eating, drinking, and breathing. We have to eat, drink, and breathe Christ day by day to sustain our spiritual life. It is so simple.
Hymns, #255 by A. B. Simpson is a hymn on breathing in the Lord. The chorus of this hymn says,
The first time I introduced this hymn was in 1963. There was a brother among us then who had a Brethren background. When he first heard this hymn, he did not like it because it was against his religious concept. But eventually this brother learned how to breathe in the Lord, and he appreciated this hymn. We can never give up breathing. Breathing is simple, but it is not simple to explain.
Today the Lord is the Spirit, and He is also the Word. On the one hand, the Spirit is the pneuma, the breath (John 20:22). On the other hand, the Word is also the breath. Second Timothy 3:16 says that all Scripture is God-breathed. So every part of the Scripture is a part of the divine breath. As the Spirit and the Word, the Lord is the breath. Strictly speaking, you can never get the Word into you as life merely by reading it. The only way for you to get the Word into you as life is by breathing. All Scripture is God-breathed. If you are going to get the Word as the breath into you, you have to breathe. Of course, we need to read the Bible, but mere reading does not work. We have to read the Word by breathing.
Let me illustrate a little bit to you. John 3:16 says that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. If I merely read this verse, nothing will happen. But if I breathe in this verse by pray-reading through calling on the name of the Lord, the Lord will come into me. You need prayer to match your reading, prayer to mingle with your reading. While you are reading, you need to pray. This prayer is your breathing, and this breathing is by calling upon the name of the Lord.
Ephesians 5:22 says that wives should be subject to their own husbands. Many wives appreciate others’ husbands, but the Lord tells them to be subject to their own husbands. After reading this verse a number of times, a sister may make up her mind to be subject to her own husband. But this does not work. She received the word in black and white and gained knowledge in her mind, but she did not get life. The way to take this word into us as life is to mingle our reading with prayer. A sister could pray, “O Lord, wives. O Lord, wives. Be subject. O Lord. Lord, I can’t be subject. To your own husband. O Lord, I can be subject to others’ husbands but not to my own. O Lord! O Lord, I need You to be my person!” When you mingle your reading with prayer in this way, you receive the Lord as life. I would advise you never to make up your mind to be subject. That is a kind of temptation. When you make up your mind to be subject, you have turned from the tree of life to the tree of knowledge. But when you read the Word with prayer, this is the feeding on the tree of life.
Romans 6:6 says that our old man has been crucified with Christ. But if you make up your mind to reckon yourself dead, this will not work. No verse of the Bible will work in this way. This is the wrong way. You cannot take the Word into you as life by mere reading. Many Christians read the Bible, but their lives have remained the same for many years. Many Bible readers have gotten a lot of knowledge from the Bible but no life. Thus, there is no transformation, no inward, metabolic change. This is because they have made the word of the Bible the letter, and the letter kills (2 Cor. 3:6). They make the book of life a book of knowledge. Knowledge puffs up (1 Cor. 8:1), and knowledge brings in death. The right way is to read the Word by breathing, to read the Word by calling on the name of the Lord, so that we may make the Word one with the Spirit.
The secret, the key, is the calling, because calling on the name of the Lord is the breathing (Lam. 3:55-56). We all need to call on the name of the Lord. Whenever you read any verse, any chapter, or any portion of the Bible, you have to call on the name of the Lord. All the time mingle your reading with your calling. Mere reading does not work. You have to turn your reading into praying by calling on the name of the Lord.
The proper pray-reading with the calling on the name of the Lord really nourishes us. When we breathe in the Lord, we also receive Him as our food and drink. The food is one with the water, and the water is one with the breath. Within the breath is the water, and within the water is the food. This is revealed clearly throughout the whole Bible. The tree of life as food grows in the water of life (Rev. 22:1-2). This proves that the food is in the water. Also, the water is in the breath. So when we breathe in the breath, we get the water. Thus, with the breathing, there is the drinking, and with the drinking, there is the eating. The eating and the drinking are included in the breathing, and the breathing is our calling on the name of the Lord.
First Corinthians also shows us the eating, the drinking, and the calling. Chapter 10 says that we eat the same spiritual food and drink the same spiritual drink (vv. 3-4). Then chapter 12 shows that we all have been given to drink one Spirit (v. 13) by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus. “No one can say, Jesus is Lord! except in the Holy Spirit” (v. 3b). In other words, whenever you say, “Lord Jesus,” you are drinking of the Spirit. If you merely read the Word without calling on His name, you cannot get the nourishment. But if you call on the Lord, you experience the refreshing, the watering, and the nourishing. On the other hand, if you merely call on the name of the Lord, you still miss something. You need the Word to match your calling. This is the way to breathe, drink, and eat, to take Christ in as our air, water, and food. Then we enjoy Him as our abundant life.
We cannot stay away from the Word and the Spirit. We have the Spirit within and the Word without. Today we have these two greatest gifts as our wealth. We can receive these gifts by mingling our reading with praying and our calling on the name of the Lord. Whenever we read the Bible, we have to pray and call on the name of the Lord. It is by this calling that we breathe, by this breathing that we drink, and by this drinking that we eat the Lord. We need to mingle these three things together: calling, praying, and reading. We need to make these three things one.
I would advise you that whenever you touch the word of the Bible, right away you have to call on the name of the Lord. You should have the strong sensation that if you merely read the Word without calling on the name of the Lord, that is a big loss. Whenever you open up the Word and read it, right away you have to call on the name of the Lord. It is by this that you breathe. When you breathe, you drink, and when you drink, you eat. The Word gets into you as life and as the life supply. Then the Word will be one with the Spirit within you to refresh you, to water you, to nourish you, and to give you the growth. It is by this that we take the Lord in again and again.
Make calling, praying, and reading three-in-one. Then it will be hard to discern whether you are reading, praying, or calling on the name of the Lord. While you are calling, you are praying; while you are praying, you are reading; while you are reading, you are praying; and while you are praying, you are calling. Then the word of the Bible becomes spirit and life to you (John 6:63). It is by this way that we take the Lord into us all the time. This is absolutely different from today’s Christian religion.
Even in the book of Revelation, there is the same concept of taking in the Lord. The Lord says, “To him who overcomes, to him I will give to eat of the tree of life” (2:7). Then He says, “Let him who wills take the water of life freely” (22:17). To eat of the tree of life and to drink of the water of life are the main aspects in the book of Revelation. This book at the conclusion of the whole Bible shows that out of the redeeming God flows the river of water of life, and in the river of water of life grows the tree of life (vv. 1-2). The river of water of life is flowing, and the tree of life is growing.
At the end of the whole Bible, the last call from God is a call to take the water of life freely (v. 17). The Spirit and the bride yearn that the thirsty ones would come to take the water of life for their satisfaction. When you drink the water, you get the food. This is God’s final call, and this will produce the new city, the holy city, the New Jerusalem. All that we need is to come and drink the water of life so that we may feed on Christ as the tree of life. This will produce the Body of Christ, the church life, the local churches, and ultimately the holy city, New Jerusalem.
Now we have seen the secret of how to take in Christ, that is, to breathe Him, to drink Him, and to eat Him. The way is by calling upon Him and praying and reading, by mingling these three things together as one. This is the way to contact the Spirit and touch the Word. In this way we can participate in Christ all the time. Christ today is the air, the water, and the food. After He gets into us, He will do a lot of things. We must be willing to put aside our old concept and learn to call upon the name of the Lord, to pray by reading, and to read by praying. We must learn to mingle calling, reading, and praying into one. Then we will enjoy Christ and take Christ into us day by day. This will accomplish many things within us to fulfill God’s eternal purpose.
